Shouldn't…but Do

I fell apart on the cooking aisle.  Which is not to say that my form of disassemblage is histrionics, but rather a sort of repetitive babbling that disposes of the notion that great leaps of logic require any explanation.

My habit is Sunday morning early at the big box grocery store.  When my children are with X, it takes a little longer, given friendships I have struck up with employees in various areas of the store – pharmacy, up to hardware, pet aisle, grocery, produce, meat counter, on to check-out.

The greeters are nice too, but the most recent, Rich, moved to Tuesdays and Thursdays only, leaving the Sunday morning greeter slot empty.

On the cooking aisle I ran into Bob.  I have only come to know Bob-people in the last year.  Prior to that, I do not recall many memorable Bob-people.  I now know two Bob-people, one on the cooking aisle and one further away, in the land of New Jersey.

As with Bob of New Jersey,  Bob of the  Cooking Aisle is nice too.  He works at the grocery store, using an  electronic gizmo to size up  shelves that need restocking.

Bob of the Cooking Aisle and I fell to chatting, then a  longer discussion on the vicissitudes of divorce and my $4,000 legal bill.

There is a point in any real conversation when chat turns to talk and the polite salutation of summary greeting falls away.  Conditions – life and times – can be shared then, regardless of social status, age or intellectual predilection.

So it was with Bob of the Cooking Aisle.  As the talk took a necessary turn back to the shoppping and gizmo-zapping at hand, I began walking up and down the cooking aisle, looking for several errant spices.

Somewhere between the cake mix and the coriander, I realized I was trapped forever on the cooking aisle, unnerved by the discussion of meaningless financial ruin.  Repeatedly referring to my list, seeking, not finding.

Up and down the aisle, a nervous cross between a widow’s walk and the desperate necessity of finding just the right hat before my turn on the gallows pole.  All that was missing was unbound hair, streaming eyes, and the throat to toe disheveled black  mourning dress.

With some grace, Bob of the Cooking Aisle asked what I was looking for.  He located it, right in front of me (but you knew that), liberating me from purgatory on the cooking aisle.

The alchemist, they say, is cooked while cooking.  And what better place than on the cooking aisle.